Hidden In Plain Sight
by butterfly.cell
Summary: There was a piece of Ianto Jones’ history that had been wiped from his records. Every trace of it was gone from his paperwork and had been buried for the past nine months. - Post!Cyberwoman idea, Jack/Ianto kinda


**Title**: Hidden In Plain Sight  
**Rating**: 15  
**Characters/Pairings**: Jack/Ianto  
**Spoilers**: Everything up to 1x04 (incl. DW S2 finale)  
**Warnings**: Situations; Implied pain/violence  
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Summary**: There was a piece of Ianto Jones' history that had been wiped from his records. Every trace of it was gone from his paperwork and had been buried for the past nine months. It would've stayed there if Jack hadn't taken Ianto's 'secret project' as a personal offence.

**Disclaimer**: The boys and Gwen don't belong to me, RTD and BBC own 'em

Author's Note: I had this idea a while ago, dunno what brought it on, but it returned to me earlier and I finished writing it up! I hope you enjoy it! Just been to see Witches of Eastwick with Marti Pellow, after this I'm off to watch Planet of the Dead - Can't wait!

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Hidden In Plain Sight

There was a piece of Ianto Jones' history that had been wiped from his records. Every trace of it was gone from his paperwork and had been buried for the past nine months. It would've stayed there if Jack hadn't taken Ianto's 'secret project' as a personal offence.

The cyber woman in the basement had been a shock to Jack's system. Before then, he'd fancied that he knew everything there was to know about his employees - but Lisa had been like a sledgehammer to his perception of his team. Broken and unaligned, Jack had spent the past eight days repairing it.

When, after a long and hard day of constantly changing his mind, he visited Ianto's flat, he thought he knew all there was to know about him once more.

It turned out that the massacre eight nights before had only been the tip of the iceberg.

He let himself into the flat after ten minutes of unanswered knocking. Toeing his shoes off carefully by the door, he moved through the living area and followed the harsh sound of a shower running. He followed the sound down the corridor and into the bedroom, realising the bathroom must be en-suite. Slowly, he approached the door, standing ajar with pale light and steam tumbling through it. He knocked again. No answer.

"Ianto?" He called out. Again, no answer. Pushing the door open, he stepped inside to see a figured curled up under the jet of water.

The young man was dressed in pyjama trousers and a thin t-shirt, seemingly unaware of anything around him.

"Ianto?" Jack spoke again, suddenly concerned about him. He didn't even look around. Jack moved forwards and knelt by the bath, reaching up to turn the shower off. "Ianto, talk to me. Are you okay?"

The young man made some sort of non-committal noise and Jack's frown deepened. He hadn't dealt with a situation like this for a long time. The last time he'd seen someone in this condition, it had been in the trenches of World War Two, one of his officers in shock from a particularly brutal shrapnel bomb. It had taken out seven of his fellows – three practically ripped in half by the force and the debris.

He gently put his hand on Ianto's arm, but the young man flinched away, clamping his hand over his right shoulder before Jack's fingers could fall.

"Ianto, you need to get out of those clothes before you freeze." Jack's voice was soft, but half reprimanding. He tried to stay away from the thoughts about why Ianto had behaved that way or how long he'd already been sitting there.

"You can't see it." The young man spoke gruffly, shying away from where Jack was, curling towards the wall.

"See what?" Jack frowned again and stayed put.

"You're not allowed to see!" Ianto turned on him, glaring in a mix of anxiety and fear. Jack simply held his hands up in acceptance.

"Okay, okay. I'll go outside and wait for you to get changed." Jack stood up and backed away from the bath and through the door. He pulled it almost closed and walked back through the flat.

He took a few minutes to do a brief checks of the food supplies and to see how he'd been living for the past week before heading back to find out how Ianto was doing. The bathroom door stood ajar again, but Jack didn't go any further. He knew the moment he opened the door, Ianto would be on the defensive once more.

Before any of these logical, cunning thoughts could cut through to the front of his mind, he froze in shock.

Through the slit in the door, he saw Ianto standing in front of the mirror, peeling the skin away from his shoulder. Wait, _what_? No! It wasn't skin, it was a prosthetic layer that just looked like skin. With rising dread, he watched the layer peel away to reveal a mass of ugly, discoloured scars, forming a distinct shape.

He could see the angry purple lines and massacred skin that ran crisscross through and across the shape, but his eyes were drawn to the edge. The spell was broken before he could take a closer look as Ianto tossed the skin like layer away and reached for a t-shirt.

Not caring about Ianto's reaction, he pushed the door open and walked inside, seeing Ianto tense where he bent towards a spare shirt, fingers freezing in position as he forgot just what he was doing. Underneath the fluorescent strip light, he knew there was no way Jack couldn't see. There couldn't be.

He straightened up silently, looking away from where Jack stood, his eyes burning into him, leaving Ianto feeling increasingly uncomfortable and self conscious. His hand moved up to grip the opposite arm, fingers splayed out to cover the angry scars on his right shoulder.

"What happened to you, Ianto?" Jack asked quietly, his voice intense with an anger that wasn't directed at him. Somehow – and god knows how – Ianto knew he wasn't the object of Jack's disgust.

"Asides from the obvious, you mean?" There was a hint of sarcasm in his voice and Jack almost smiled.

"Well, yeah. Asides from that. What're you hiding now?" Ianto flinched at the words and jack bit his tongue to stop a retort. It was unfair to have brought that up. He held his breath in the hope that Ianto would reply.

It took several long, tense minutes before he turned round completely, avoiding Jack's eyes but stepping a little closer and letting his hand fall from it's vice like grip a little.

Tentatively, Jack closed the gap between them and reached a hand forwards. Ianto flinched at first and Jack's fingers pulled back slightly before moving forwards again, cautiously pulling away the young man's hands. He brought his second hand up to inspect what he saw, to run his fingers over the surreal, almost unbelievable marks in an attempt to understand, to make it all make sense. He frowned.

This couldn't be right.

"She did this to you?" He asked incredulously, looking up to see the young man shake his head harshly.

"Canary Wharf." His tone was blunt and defeated.

His fingers moved gently across the brutalised skin, hesitating slightly at the soft chill where the skin was pure scar, the wounds looking quite newly healed. Frowning, he let his attention be drawn back tot eh edge of the shape as he noticed a line of equally spaced, jagged circles that looked more like bolt holes than anything.

It was as if someone had poured ice down his back.

His fingers stilled and his entire being froze. He felt and heard Ianto's heart rate increase, but the young man had frozen as well.

"How the hell did you get it out?" Jack spoke in a harsh whisper, awed by his discovery.

"I pulled it out. It hadn't settled and I tore it away from my shoulder without thinking." Ianto's voice was rough and Jack could hear the edge of hysteria there. The memories can't have been good.

The scar was the shape of a cyber conversion panel. It was part of the outfit added to upgrade human bodies. The scar ran heavily across his shoulder and extended down the shoulder blade and across his collar bone as well. Conveniently, it was low enough to be easily hidden by t-shirts.

"You survived." Jack looked at the young man, fingers still resting on the raised circles form where Ianto had wrenched the metal from himself.

And suddenly everything made sense to him. In that split second, he let go of all blame and hurt of betrayal. Now, he understood. As if for the first time, he looked at the young man for who he really was.

"Why isn't this in your files? Surely you got treatment for it?" Jack looked at him and Ianto couldn't help but look back. When the captain noticed he was shivering slightly, he ran a hand across each of his bare shoulders, holding gently to his upper arms.

"The stitched it and gave me the prosthetic sleeves… I wiped it all, I didn't think you'd give me a job." He looked away harshly, swallowing audibly. "What I did was bad enough, but this would've signed my death warrant 'possible infiltration of micro-technology'. That's what they put on the report. For all I know, there is something that could take me over. You should've shot me when you had the chance."

Jack stared at him, completely baffled the raging emotions inside him. Spite reared its head and smirked at him that he should've, anger told him to punch him in the mouth for talking that way, guilt sneered that this was his fault because he didn't see sooner, but most of all, a new affection and intense concern washed through him and swept everything else away.

He pulled Ianto towards him, enclosing his thin frame in his arms and securing him. Ianto tentatively rested his head against Jack's shoulder as sighed, his breath shuddering out of him as his arms moved automatically around the warm, caring presence in front of him. It had been so long…

Without resistance, he let Jack guide him through to the bedroom and find a long sleeved t-shirt, pulling it over his head carefully with a few murmured instructions. He briefly thought about how glad he was that he'd already changed into dry pyjama trousers before Jack had walked into the bathroom.

Gently, Jack folded the covers back a little, giving Ianto room to sit down. As he moved away, he found Ianto's hand gripping tightly to his shirt sleeve, looking up at him with wide eyes.

"I'm sorry, sir." He whispered, the words mirrored to the core in his eyes. In a blink it was gone as he looked away, seeming to recover some of the young man Jack had come to 'know'.

"I know, Ianto." Jack said gently, trying to smile encouragingly. Ianto just looked away and lay down on his side, snaking his legs under the warm, heavy duvet.

"I'm fine now, sir. You should really head back to the Hub." He spoke almost mechanically, facing away form Jack so the captain couldn't see just how wrong those words were.

"No way." Jack's voice was firm and Ianto looked up, frowning slightly in confusion. Jack crossed to the other side of the bed and sat down. Ianto sat up slightly and couldn't help but meet his eyes. Reaching forwards, Jack placed his palm flat over a cut on the young man's neck, caused by the vice like grip Lisa had held him in before throwing him across the Hub. He could feel the gentle heat radiating from the thin strip.

He leaned forwards and pressed a firm, apologetic kiss to the young man's lips, letting the touch linger slightly for a moment before pulling away and removing his hand.

"Get some sleep, Ianto, you look exhausted." He smiled weakly and Ianto nodded gently, sliding back down onto his side. Jack helped him pull the duvet back over his shoulder and settled down on the free side of the bed.

He shrugged his coat off and lay it on the floor next to him before turning his attention back to Ianto.

He understood now. Ianto had been in love with Lisa, but felt guilty at the same time. He'd been in a conversion unit as well, the process starting no more than a couple of minutes later… but he'd survived. By pure luck, he'd been saved when the Doctor had closed the Rift.

He'd been able to wrench the monstrosity from himself and had dragged Lisa's body from the ruins. Maybe she'd still been his Lisa then, maybe she was already insane with what had happened or maybe her mind had already been taken by the implants. Whatever it was, Ianto had chosen to believe that she could be saved.

Jack sighed and glanced at the now sleeping form. He looked like he was at peace, resting safely with no threats of being accused or hated or shunned. He only hoped that it would stay that way for as long as possible.

He knew though, less than half an hour later, that Ianto's dreams hadn't been and wouldn't be peaceful again for a very long time.


End file.
